Hunting Time Read online

  ALSO BY JEFFERY DEAVER

  NOVELS

  The Colter Shaw Series

  The Final Twist

  The Goodbye Man

  The Never Game

  The Lincoln Rhyme Series

  The Midnight Lock

  The Cutting Edge

  The Burial Hour

  The Steel Kiss

  The Skin Collector

  The Kill Room

  The Burning Wire

  The Broken Window

  The Cold Moon

  The Twelfth Card

  The Vanished Man

  The Stone Monkey

  The Empty Chair

  The Coffin Dancer

  The Bone Collector

  The Kathryn Dance Series

  Solitude Creek

  XO

  Roadside Crosses

  The Sleeping Doll

  The Rune Series

  Hard News

  Death of a Blue Movie Star

  Manhattan Is My Beat

  The John Pellam Series

  Hell’s Kitchen

  Bloody River Blues

  Shallow Graves

  Stand-Alones

  The October List

  Carte Blanche (A James Bond Novel)

  Edge

  The Bodies Left Behind

  Garden of Beasts

  The Blue Nowhere

  Speaking in Tongues

  The Devil’s Teardrop

  A Maiden’s Grave

  Praying for Sleep

  The Lesson of Her Death

  Mistress of Justice

  SHORT FICTION COLLECTIONS

  Trouble in Mind

  Triple Threat

  More Twisted

  Twisted

  SHORT FICTION INDIVIDUAL STORIES

  The Deadline Clock, a Colter Shaw Story

  Scheme

  A Perfect Plan, a Lincoln Rhyme Story

  Cause of Death

  Turning Point

  Verona

  The Debriefing

  Ninth and Nowhere

  The Second Hostage, a Colter Shaw Story

  Captivated, a Colter Shaw Story

  The Victims’ Club

  Surprise Ending

  Double Cross

  Vows, a Lincoln Rhyme Story

  The Deliveryman, a Lincoln Rhyme Story

  A Textbook Case

  ORIGINAL AUDIO WORKS

  The Starling Project, a Radio Play

  Stay Tuned

  The Intruder

  Date Night

  EDITOR/CONTRIBUTOR

  No Rest for the Dead (Contributor)

  Watchlist (Creator/Contributor)

  The Chopin Manuscript (Creator/Contributor)

  The Copper Bracelet (Creator/Contributor)

  Nothing Good Happens After Midnight (Editor/Contributor)

  Ice Cold (Co-Editor/Contributor)

  A Hot and Sultry Night for Crime (Editor/Contributor)

  Books to Die For (Contributor)

  The Best American Mystery Stories 2009 (Editor)

  G. P. Putnam’s Sons

  Publishers Since 1838

  An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC

  penguinrandomhouse.com

  Copyright © 2022 by Gunner Publications, LLC

  Penguin Random House supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin Random House to continue to publish books for every reader.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Deaver, Jeffery, author.

  Title: Hunting time / Jeffery Deaver.

  Description: New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 2022. | Series: A Colter Shaw Novel; 4

  Identifiers: LCCN 2022040283 (print) | LCCN 2022040284 (ebook) | ISBN 9780593422083 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780593422090 (ebook)

  Classification: LCC PS3554.E1755 H86 2022 (print) | LCC PS3554.E1755 (ebook) | DDC 813/.54—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022040283

  LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022040284

  Cover design: Tal Goretsky

  Cover images: (man) Maria Heyens / Arcangel; (woman) Miguel Sobreira / Plainpicture; (factory) DEEPOL by Plainpicture; (sky) Spreephoto.de / Moment / Getty Images

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  pid_prh_6.0_141796651_c0_r0

  Contents

  Cover

  Also by Jeffery Deaver

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Part One: The Pocket Sun

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Part Two: Hide and Seek

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  Chapter 77

  Chapter 78

  Chapter 79

  Chapter 80

  Chapter 81

  Chapter 82

  Chapter 83

  Chapter 84

  Chapter 85

  Chapter 86

  Chapter 87

  Chapter 88

  Chapter 89

  Chapter 90

  Chapter 91

  Chapter 92

  Chapter 93

  Part Three: Never

  Chapter 94

  Chapter 95

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  To all my friends at the Kastens Hotel Luisenhof, in Hannover, for their true kindness and generosity during my recent trip to Germany. Danke Schoen!

  To be human is to be an engineer.

  —Billy Vaughn Koen, Discussion of the Method

  PART ONE

  THE POCKET SUN

  TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 20

  1

  The trap was simplicity itself.

  And as usual with simple, it worked perfectly.

  In the long-abandoned fourth-floor workshop of Welbourne & Sons Fabricators, Colter Shaw moved silently through dusty wooden racks stacked with rusty tanks and drums. Twenty feet ahead, the shelves ended and beyond was a large open area, filled with ancient mahogany worktables, scuffed and stained and gone largely to rot and mold.

  Here stood three men, wearing somber business suits, engaged in conversation, offering the animated gestures and the untroubled voices of those who have no idea they’re being watched.

  Shaw paused and, out of sight behind a row of shelves, withdrew a video camera. It was similar to any you’d pick up on Amazon or at Best Buy, except for one difference: there was no lens in front. Instead the glass eye was a tiny thing mounted on an eighteen-inch fl
exible stalk. This he bent at a ninety-degree angle and aimed around the side of the storage shelves before hitting record.

  After a few minutes, when the men’s backs were to him, he stepped out of his hiding place and moved closer, slipping behind the last row of shelves.

  Which was when the trap sprung.

  His shoe caught the trip wire, which in turn pulled a pin from the supporting leg of the shelf nearest to him, releasing an avalanche of tanks and cans and drums. He rolled forward onto the floor, avoiding the bigger ones, but several slammed onto his shoulders.

  The three men spun about. Two were of Middle Eastern appearance—Saudi, Shaw knew. The other was Anglo, as pale as the others were dark. The taller of the Saudis—who went by Rass—held a gun, which he’d drawn quickly when Shaw made his ungainly appearance. They joined the intruder, who was rising from the grainy floor, and studied their catch: an athletic blond man in his thirties, wearing blue jeans, a black T and a leather jacket. Shaw’s right hand was gripping his left shoulder. He winced as his fingers kneaded the joint.

  Rass picked up the spy camera, looked it over and shut it off. He pocketed the device and Shaw said goodbye to twelve hundred dollars. This was not a priority at the moment.

  Ahmad, the other Saudi, sighed. “Well.”

  The third man, whose name was Paul LeClaire, looked momentarily horrified and then settled into miserable.

  Shaw’s blue eyes glanced at the collapsed shelf with disgust and he stepped away from the drums, some of which were leaking sour-smelling chemicals.

  Simplicity itself . . .

  “Wait!” LeClaire frowned. “I know him! He’s working for Mr. Harmon. He’s in human resources. I mean, that’s what he said. But he was undercover! Shit!” His voice cracked.

  Shaw wondered if he was going to cry.

  “Police?” Ahmad asked LeClaire.

  “I don’t know. How would I know?”

  “I’m not law,” said Shaw. “Private.” He turned a stern face to LeClaire. “Hired to find Harmon’s Judas.”

  Ahmad walked to a window and looked out, scanned the alley. “Anyone else?” Directed at Shaw.

  “No.”

  The man then stepped to the front of the workshop, his body language suggesting taut muscles beneath the fine gray suit. He slowly opened the door, looked out, then closed it. He returned to the others. “You,” he said to LeClaire. “Check him. Weapons. And whatever’s in his pockets.”

  “Me?”

  Ahmad: “We weren’t followed. You were careless.”

  “No, I wasn’t. Really. I’m sure.”

  Ahmad lifted a palm: We’re not paying you to whine.

  LeClaire, more dismal by the moment, walked forward. He patted down Shaw cautiously. He was doing a sloppy job and if Shaw had been carrying, which he was not, he would have missed the semiauto Shaw often wore on his hip.

  But his uneasy fingers managed to locate and retrieve the contents of Shaw’s pockets. He stepped away, clutching the cell phone, cash, a folding knife, a wallet. Deposited them on a dust-covered table.

  Shaw continued to knead his shoulder, and Rass tilted his head toward him, silently warning him to be cautious in his movements. Rass’s finger was outside the trigger guard of the pistol. In this, he knew what he was doing. On the other hand, the gun, with its mirrored sheen of chrome plating, was showy. Not the sort a true pro would carry.

  Never draw attention to your weapon . . .

  LeClaire was looking toward an open attaché case. Inside was a gray metal box measuring fourteen inches by ten by two. From it sprouted a half-dozen wires, each a different color. To Shaw he said, “He knows? About me? Mr. Harmon knows?”

  Colter Shaw rarely responded to questions whose answers were as obvious as the sky.

  And sometimes you didn’t answer just to keep the inquirer on edge. The businessman rubbed thumb and index finger together. Both hands. Curiously simultaneous. The misery factor expanded considerably.

  Ahmad looked at the phone. “Passcode.”

  Rass lifted the gun.

  One wouldn’t be much of a survivalist to get killed over a PIN. Shaw recited the digits.

  Ahmad scrolled. “Just says he’s coming to the factory to check out a lead. It’s sent to a local area code. Others to the same number. He has our names.” A look to LeClaire. “All of ours.”

  “Oh, Christ . . .”

  “He’s been onto you for a while, Paul.” Ahmad scrolled some more, then tossed the phone to a desk. “No immediate risk. The plans still hold. But let’s get this over with.” He removed a thick envelope from his pocket and handed it to LeClaire, who, not bothering to count his pieces of silver, stuffed it away.

  “And him?” LeClaire’s strident voice asked.

  Ahmad thought for a moment, then gestured Shaw back, against a wall.

  Shaw walked to where the man indicated and continued to massage his shoulder. Pain radiated downward, as if pulled by gravity.

  Ahmad picked up the wallet and riffled through the contents, then put the billfold in his pocket. “All right. I know who you are, how to find you. But I don’t think that troubles you so much.” He scanned Shaw, face to feet. “You can take care of yourself. But I also have the names of everyone on your in-case-of-emergency list. What you’re going to do is tell Harmon you tracked the thief here but by the time you managed to get into the factory we were gone.”

  LeClaire said, “But he knows it’s me!”

  Ahmad and Rass seemed as tired of the whimpering as Shaw was.

  “Are we clear on everything?”

  “Couldn’t be clearer.” Shaw turned to Paul LeClaire. “But I have to ask: Aren’t you feeling the least bit guilty? There are about two million people around the world whose lives you just ruined.”

  “Shut up.”

  He really couldn’t think up any better retort?

  Silence filled the room . . . No, near silence, moderated by white noise, unsettling, like the hum of coursing blood in your skull.

  Shaw looked over the configuration of where each man stood and he realized that examining the wallet and the in-case-of-emergency threat were tricks—to get him to move to a certain spot in the room, away from the drums that had tumbled to the floor when the trap sprung. Ahmad had no intention of letting him go. He simply didn’t want to take the risk of his partner shooting toward canisters that might contain flammable chemicals.

  Why not kill him and buy time? The Saudis would be out of the country long before Shaw’s body was discovered. And as for LeClaire, he’d done his part, and they couldn’t care less what happened to him. He might even be a good fall guy for the murder.

  Ahmad’s dark eyes turned toward Rass and his shiny pistol.

  “Wait,” Shaw said harshly. “There’s something I—”

  2

  You’re a lucky SOB, Merritt.”

  The pale and gaunt prisoner, unshaven, brows knit, looked at the uniformed screw.

  The guard glanced at Merritt’s balding head, as if just realizing now that the man had more hair when he’d begun serving his sentence than now. What a difference a near year makes.

  The men, both tough, both fatigued, faced each other through a half-inch of bulletproof glass, a milky sheet as smeared as the walls were scuffed. The business end of eighty-year-old Trevor County Detention had no desire, or reason, to pretty itself up.

  Slim, tall Jon Merritt was dressed in a dark suit—the deepest shade of navy blue, good for job interviews and funerals. It was a size too big. A complementing white shirt too, frayed where frays happen. The last time he had worn this outfit was more than ten months ago. In the interim his garb, not of his choosing, had been bright orange.

  “You’re looking like an ace,” the guard said. Larkin was a large Black man whose uniform was much the same shade as Merritt’s suit.

  “Oh, I just shine, don’t I?”

  The guard paused, maybe wondering how stinging the sarcasm was meant to be. “Here you go.”

  Merritt took the envelope that contained his wallet, watch and wedding ring. The ring went into his pocket, the watch onto his wrist. The battery had behaved and the instrument showed the correct time: 9:02 a.m.

  Looking through the wallet. The bills—$140—were still there, but the envelope no longer contained the coins he’d had. A credit card and an ATM card were present too. He was surprised.